The first-person shooter genre is undoubtedly one of the most popular video game genres in the world. Keeping up with the competition and staying relevant has proven to be difficult for many video game publishers, but it seems like Riot Games has mastered that art.
Riot Games’ Valorant has been out for roughly four years now and even today, it is as popular as it was back then. Certainly, making the game free-to-play is one of the main reasons behind its success but it’s hard to keep a game relevant and fresh. It’s not like Valorant is immortal, the game also loses its player count every once in a while but Riot Games has cracked the code.
Riot Games Understands That Players Like To Take A Break From The Game
In a recent interview, production director Arnar Gylfason, talked about the decline in the number of active Valorant players. When asked if Valorant is also affected by sudden dips in its popularity, Gylfason told PCGamesN,
One of the things we’ve seen in the gaming space in general is that games – both genres and specific games – have this ebb and flow. I think it’s healthy. Like any other game, we see players take a break from [Valorant], then come back, and so you have these natural ‘seasonalities’ in how many players are playing and engaging. Overall, where Valorant is today, I think we’re very happy with the player numbers.
Gylfason explained that it is healthy that players have choices and options. Despite so much competition, Valorant has managed to remain relevant and it is all because of the operating model that Riot Games has been following. Many major video game publishers often panic when their games are losing popularity, and in some cases, their rushed content makes the game worse than it was.
Riot Games Needs To Address Various Issues In The Game
Riot Games is well-known for quickly resolving issues in Valorant. With constant updates, the studio has improved the game a lot over the past four years, however, there are still some issues in the game that Riot Games should rework in future updates.
In terms of agents, players have been asking Riot Games to rework the abilities of various agents, particularly Harbor and Chamber. This year, Reyna was balanced but the nerf to her Devour ability has made the agent weak. Reyna mains have criticized this move, but it was clearly necessary to make the game fair for everyone else.
Abyss, a map that was added recently, is not exactly popular among the community. The map requires some tweaks because not everyone is a fan of this big map with no protective walls.
Gylfason has confirmed that they “have all these big ideas” for the game, in fact, Riot Games has confirmed in a recent YouTube video that major aspects of the game such as player behaviors, balance, and anti-cheat will be addressed very soon.
Do you think Riot Games is following the right strategy? Share your opinions in the comments!
